You are not the first person who is confused between online and offline modes of shopping; especially when it comes to purchasing a mobile phone.

Doing price comparisons before buying a phone is no doubt time consuming exercise; and when we add the offline vertical, then the process becomes even more complicated.

PriceBaba, which is a price comparison engine for mobile phones, have come up with an interesting case study: “Mobile Price WARS: Online Vs. Offline”; which basically finds out the trend of mobile phone pricing on online and offline turfs.

The research has been done based on the searches of 4.5 million monthly visitors on PriceBaba, analyzing the pricing of the top 150 mobile phones (as per their own website), and then comparing their prices on various online and offline locations.

For the online part, they have compared Flipkart, Amazon and Snapdeal; for offline research, they have studies prices of mobile phones in Delhi, Bangalore and Mumbai.

Online Beats Offline

Out of 150 mobile phones, 94 were cheaper online, whereas only 56 were found to be cheaper offline.

How much is the average difference?

On an average, the same mobile phone is cheaper by Rs 1148 online, compared to offline

Cheapest Online Destination?

Among these three, Snapdeal has most of the cheapest mobile phones. Out of 94 mobile phones, which are cheaper online, 51 were found on Snapdeal; whereas Flipkart had 23 and Amazon had 20. Thus, 33.96% of the cheapest phones today are found on Snapdeal.

Most Expensive Offline Market?

Out of the 56 cheapest mobile phones found offline, only 12 were found in the markets of Delhi; which makes it as the most expensive market to buy a mobile phone. Mumbai is the cheapest, as out of 56, 25 mobile phones were found in the city. Bangalore had 19 cheapest mobiles.

Which Brands Are Cheapest?

The research discovered that Apple and Micromax are using the online medium to perfection, as most of their products are cheaper online. On the other hand, Samsung, Sony and Lava are gambling more on offline mode, as most of their products are cheaper in the offline market.

The report showcased that at the time of writing, Apple iPhone 6 Plus (16 GB) is available for Rs 50,900 on Snapdeal (cheapest ecommerce portal), whereas in the offline market in Mumbai (cheapest city for offline purchases), its minimum price is Rs 54,000.

On the other hand, Samsung Galaxy S6 (64 GB) is priced Rs 45,000 in offline markets of Mumbai, whereas its listed for Rs 47,900 on Amazon and Flipkart!

This research can be an interesting case study on the present online vs offline war.

As we have seen, offline retailers are boycotting specific mobile phones and companies for protesting against online retailers; they are demanding ‘entry tax’ on online purchases; and even filing court cases to stop the spread of ecommerce.

But as we can see from this research, the price difference is considerably massive on ecommerce platforms; but in some areas, offline is cheaper. We can conclude that India is sufficiently big market to accommodate both online and offline retailers; both have their own distinctive advantages, and both can survive with peace.

Mohul keenly observes the nuances of Indian startup world; and tries to demystify the secrets behind Technology, Marketing, Mobile and Internet. He is a Writer by passion, Marketer by choice and Entrepreneur by compulsion. Follow him on Twitter here: @_mohul